Superman (casting, rumors, pix till release)

Of course, anyone who's actually paid any attention to what's known about the movie understands that there's a reason we see Clark "wandering around" bearded. It's got nothing to do with angsty self-absorption.

Back in the pre-Crisis days, Supes's hair didn't grow normally under a yellow sun. Byrne brought in the ability for his hair and beard to grow, and had him shaving using his heat vision reflected off a piece the spacecraft that brought him to Earth. FWIW.

Back in the pre-Crisis days, Supes's hair didn't grow normally under a yellow sun. Byrne brought in the ability for his hair and beard to grow, and had him shaving using his heat vision reflected off a piece the spacecraft that brought him to Earth. FWIW.

Smith accepts the eye laser explanation only because it was put forth by legendary comic book writer John Byrne, who helped relaunch the Superman franchise and offered the explanation in the late 1980s.

Lest you think this is just the conceit of television writers, this idea first actually came up during the seminal 1986 reboot of Superman, The Man Of Steel, written and drawn by John Byrne. Apparently this bothered Byrne so much he actually went out of his way to explain it in great detail, and that explanation has been the standard ever since.

Got to go to a screening tonight for Man of Steel so, obviously, I took the opportunity and went. Suffered through drive-time traffic to go to a theater on the other end of the city, an area I wasn't greatly familiar with and got turned around getting home but, in the end, go to see this movie two weeks before most everyone else.

In a word: Decent.

Our story starts off on Krypton where Jor-El is trying to convince the council to take steps to save what they can of their people because Krypton is about to implode due to over-mining of the planet's core. The council is shooing Jor-El away when things are interrupted by General Zod who's angry with the path Krypton has taken and wants to use a device to raise Krypton in his own way using a genetic lineage stored in the device (the Codec?) It seems Krypton has has no natural births in centuries as each Kryptonian is selectively-bred through genetic engineering to fullfill a specific role in society perfectly. (Hmmmm...) That is except for one, Jor-El has just recently helped birth Krypton's first natural-born son in eons. As Krypton crumbles the baby is placed in a space capsule and sent into space, meanwhile Zod and his followers are eventually captured and banished to serve a sentence and what we all know is the Phantom Zone. Krypton implodes/blowsup.

The baby, Kal-El, eventually makes it to Earth and is adopted by a farm family, the Kents, and is raised as their son Clark. As an adult Clark lives a secluded nomadic life "of the grid" trying to find out who he is and what his place is in the world. Along this path he finds himself working in an Arctic research station where he meets a young intrepid reporter, Lois Lane, and eventually the answers to questions he has on who he is. Things turn bad when General Zod and his fellow captors turn up at Earth demanding it hand over Kal-El when, really, Zod intends to turn Earth into a New Krypton once he regains possession of the Codec he assumes Kal-El has.

Intercut through the movie are moments from Clark's childhood, being taught by his father Jonathon Kent and his encounters with Pete Ross and Lana Lang in Smallville, as well are some scenes with Lois and her dealings in Metropolis with Editor-in-Don't Call Me-Chief Perry White. Lois being driven to find the man who had saved back at the research station during an attack.

Overall, it's a decent movie with a lot of good action scenes and some good character moments for everyone involved, as well as some nice surprises and changes in the lore most are probably used to when it comes to Superman (who doesn't even get his name until a one-off line half-way through.) Superman has some great battles with Zod and the other Kryptonian Criminals, some good interactions with Lois and the hologram projection of his father and there's some nice stuff in the flashbacks to a younger Clark with his father.

The movie also, however, feels scattershot. Instead of being a building story showing Clark's progression form child, to teen, to wandering adult to Superman it's all sort of shuffled up a bit. I think -like the 1978 movie- being more of a saga through Clark's life would've been more interesting but, granted, short on the action through a good portion of it.

Everyone does a good job in their performances I think Cavill turns in a good performance and look as Clark/Superman and Adams is great as a Lois Lane, we even get to see her stronger "Army Brat" side to some degree. Good job by the actor who played Zod -but, really, nothing beats Terrance Stamp- and Crow actually works as Superman's father, Jor-El.

Action was decent if sometimes a bit blurry and hard to follow with the Kryptonians moving at lightning speeds but my seats weren't great so that may have something to do with it. The movie also suffers a bit from the Abrhams lens-flare effect.

But, how does it set up the road to a Justice League movie/ DC-CU? (Mild Spoilers)

Eh..... I dunno. The aftereffects of Iron Man set-up the MCU nicely in a universe somewhat grounded in "a" reality that, granted, slowly introduced the fantastical and made it into a big deal by the time The Avengers came along. Here? We already have the fantastical front and center and with everything that happens this movie, well, the grander scale of the DCU is certainly in play here. It'll be interesting to see how (if) future DC-CU movies follow up. In the wake of The Avengers there was talk with the amount of damage done to NYC in the wake of the alien attack? Here? It's much, much, grander. Be interesting to see how things are worked together but, right now, it doesn't seem like they'll have nearly the cohesive universe the MCU has.

(END Spoilers)

Overall I'd recommend it, but I still think there's still a great, awesome, grand, Superman movie waiting to be made, perhaps in a sequel to this one. Is it better than Returns? Oh hell yes. Is it everything a Superman movie can and should be? Not really. It seemed to lack some awe and heart and it lacked really seeing the people of Metropolis or even the world really seeing Superman and getting behind him. Heck, the Series Finale of Smallville played that a bit better.

That's all I got.

No stinger after the credits (at least not in the preview I saw) nor is there a scene after title cards before the scrolling credits. Which, really? How is there NOT one in this day and age?

I realize this is the pre-release thread but I didn't feel like making a new thread for reviews. Someone please copy-paste my review in that future thread. For the purposes of a future poll consider my vote an A-, 8/10, or a "Good" whatever system is used.

The worst part is since he won't see the movie we'll still have to read these stupid posts after next week while we talk about what we liked and didn't like.

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I may talk about any more released footage, or mention reviews that seem to support my opinion, but honestly I'm running out of things to talk about anyway, and I am aware that its becoming more than pointless. Thats not to say I have nothing more to post (and I'm definately going to respond to posts) but after it comes out there will be less to post about, atleast when it comes to just things I'm seeing in the trailers.

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Correction. You ran out of things to say LONG AGO but that doesn't seem to have stopped you spouting the same repetitive and uninformed babble. We know your feelings about the film. Please stop.

Warner Bros. has booked a whopping 98 promotional partners worldwide — so far — that are providing about $170 million in support (on top of paid ads) for Man of Steel.

That’s even more than The Dark Knight Rises’ $150 million in third-party promos last summer. In addition to those already on board, Warners sources say even more international partners are expected before the movie takes flight June 14 in the U.S. and elsewhere this summer.

Warner Bros. would not discuss their third-party promotions or provide any figures but did confirm some of those who are involved. Sources say that Man of Steel has been a much easier movie to pitch to partners than The Dark Knight Rises, which was darker in theme and plot.